


Twenty Something

by Babydoll Ria (Babydoll_Ria)



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Drug Addiction, F/M, Family, Lawyers, M/M, Mistaken for Being in a Relationship, Multi, Rape Aftermath, Realistic, Unrequited Love, onesided relationship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-09
Updated: 2014-03-13
Packaged: 2018-01-04 04:53:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 16,609
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1076756
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Babydoll_Ria/pseuds/Babydoll%20Ria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Your twenties are your selfish years, the years you find yourself. </p><p>The years you move in with the man of your dreams but only as roommates. The years you work as a barista because you want to paint. The years you wonder if you should have said yes. The years when you fall in love with the girl who doesn't want you back. The years you pretend you actually like wine. The years you let you go.</p><p>These are the years that build you.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. September, the first year

**Author's Note:**

> I fell into the fandom.
> 
> For Samarra, Liana, and Anna
> 
> Because you encouraged it.
> 
> September of the First Year

It is five in the morning, and there is frost on the ground but it does not bother the twenty-four year old as she easily locks the door of her car behind her, and hurries into the gym.

Practise does not start until six, but she likes getting to the pool and feeling like she can breathe again.

Secretly, she has been hoping to make it to the Olympics, and so she is in the pool seven days a week, before morning practise, and after her lectures are done for the day before she drives back to the apartment she shares with Mags, her grandmother.

Her cap and goggles are left on the side of the pool, and her hair is not tied up when she dives in, feeling jolted awake like the three black coffee she has had earlier have finally kicked in.

She treads water, before doing one leisure lap around the pool, before swimming to edge and pulling on the cap and goggles.

She swims distance, eight hundred metres freestyle, four hundred metre medley, and one day she will be on the Olympic team for the marathon, a ten kilometre race.

And Annie Cresta, the girl who loves water and math, swims.

 

* * *

       

The alarm goes off at precisely six fifty seven AM, and is slammed down almost immediately. There really was no need for it. The dark haired woman has long been awake.

This is her first day as a staff reporter at The Cambridge Chronicle and she will be damned if she is even a minute late.

She runs her hair through the short brown length before she pulls it into a small ponytail, kicking the covers off of her, and padding towards the bathroom not before pushing open her roommate’s door.

It’s bit of a mess, and there’s some other girl in bed, naked and somehow very confused.

‘Finn wake the fuck up.’ She calls in, glaring at the girl. ‘You have orientation in an hour.’

From the way the pillow moves, and the muffled cussing, Johana can leave satisfied Finnick Odair is now wide awake.

It is not until she is in the shower with the hot water hitting her that her mask of indifference disgust of the random girl Finnick brought home last night melts away.

She has her dream job, a great apartment, and she has finally moved in with the man she has been in love with since freshmen year at UCLA, only as his roommate.

 

* * *

 

There is something indignifying about having to share an office, in Gale Hawthorne’s personal opinion. He graduated from Columbia at the top of his class, valedictorian and all of those great honours and he is working now, full time as a junior architecture at a very good firm.

And for the life of him, he cannot understand why he has to share an office.

It is unprofessional for him to work at the coffee shop by the corner, though he is very tempted to do that.

If it were not for the fact the barista happens to be Peeta Mellark, whom Gale swears to god is following him.

First out of Detroit, not that Mellark had to worry about gangs where he grew up, then to New York where Mellark studied oil painting at NYU, and now to Cambridge Massachusetts where he is putting his arts degree and high praise to good work, decorating lattes.

If Gale is being honest, he would not have given a single thought of Mellark being here, if it were not for the fact that Mellark is currently happily engaged to his ex-girlfriend.

 

* * *

 

There are five hundred and fifty students accepted each year to Harvard Law, and first years are divided into groups of eighty, to make it more manageable.

These are her new friends, her new enemies and her new peers.

Katniss Everdeen twists the diamond engagement ring around her finger as she listens to the dean address the students.

She has stopped listening.

She is finally here.

Peeta would tell her, her over ten year plan for revenge for her father is futile, that no one is going to take a decade old badly written safety warning to court, and there is no way she will win any form of settlement.

She doesn’t care.

Her name is called and she goes to join the group of students she will spend the year with.

 

* * *

 

 **[SMS to Katniss]** ` Good luck :)`

He drops his phone into his jean pocket, and sips his coffee calmly. The morning rush is mostly done, and he now only has another two hours before he is done.

‘She won’t say it, but she’s really nervous.’ Peeta says, continuing the conversation to his boss Mags.

He likes her, she’s a nice old lady, her face has minimal wrinkles but her hair is silver like polished utensils and she always smells of sea salt.

It rubbed off on her, from always living by the ocean, Mags joked once.

Mags and her granddaughter Annie used to live in California, right by the beach before suddenly moving to Cambridge almost ten years ago. He asked why once, but Mags just looked at him sadly, and Annie turned white. He never asked again.

Mags smiles, and the bell above the door tinkles, and they both turn to see tiny Annie slip into the coffee shop.

Mags smiles happier now, and he can see the family resemblance as Annie reflects the smile, moving behind the counter and hugging her grandmother.

‘Hi Grandma.’ He hears Annie whisper.

 ‘Hello my mermaid how was your morning swim?’

He turns away slightly, to give them some privacy. Cambridge is a lot different from Detroit, and Detroit was very different from New York City.

But family is always the same.

 

* * *

 

Dr.  Haymitch Abernathy has a B.A, L.L.M, S.J.D and has been practising law for twenty years. He is a brilliant man, as well as a certified drunk, an asshole and someone who Finnick takes great pride in pissing off.

He is also his doctorate advisor.

At first Finnick was of the opinion that Dean Snow stuck him with the department drunk as punishment for not wanting to intern with Snow’s firm.

Snow is a very well-known defense lawyer, a very good one at keeping murderers and rapist and all the filth on the street. Snow’s clients are very well known.

And call him an optimist, but  UC Berkley’s golden boy decided to go into Law to do some good.

He now thinks Haymitch is the perfect fit for him. Haymitch is very good, his cards played so closely to his chest, you forget he even has cards. And that’s how he wins.

‘Anyone good?’ Haymitch asks him, as he peers over the roster of the wannabes who think they can be a lawyer.

‘That blonde has promise.’ He smirks, thumbing a name.

‘Don’t fuck your students.’ Haymitch says bored, it’s procedure. Finnick knows the line and won’t cross it. Flirting doesn’t count.

His eyes cling to a name that sounds somewhat familiar. ‘Everdeen.’ He mutters.

Haymitch snorts, ‘We might have a lawyer then.’

 

 

 

 

 


	2. October, the first year

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I have this sense that I didn't really start growing up until my twenties.  
> ~Winona Ryder

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Anna because you listened to me rant and rave about Hunger Games.
> 
> For Samarra because you pushed me in.
> 
> For Sara because you listen to my theories.
> 
> For Liana because you are willing to write Finnick/Annie fics for me even if you don't ship it.

Junior Staff Writer is what her official title is, but yet in the three weeks she has been at The Cambridge Chronicle, she has done absolutely no writing whatsoever.

The closest she has gotten has been fact checking an article about traffic violations.

So, to say that Johanna Mason is unimpressed is an understatement. To say she is fucking pissed off, is probably the closest most accurate description to the cocktail of resentment, jealously and anger that has slowly begun to build up.

Her weekday schedule has become one that she hates. She wakes up at six thirty every morning and kicks out whatever girl Finnick has brought in, before she brushes her teeth and goes on her morning run.  Sometimes Finnick joins her, but she usually runs alone. She’s back to the apartment by seven fifteen, in which coffee is already being made and she can shower and dress before grabbing her coffee and going to the Chronicle’s Office for eight-oh-five, for the staff meeting.

The staff meeting gives her the fact checking assignment, and then the coffee orders for the first run for the day. The first of at least ten, and it can’t be any coffee, oh no. No it has to be the tiny coffee shop a twenty minute jog to this small coffee shop.

At first, Johanna thought ‘The Fourth’ was a book store, with the walls lined with hardcover books, and the overstuffed and comfortable leather arm chairs of various earth tones.  But according to everyone at The Chronicle, The Fourth has the best coffee in all of Cambridge. It’s owned and run by Margaret Cresta, though everyone calls the old woman Mags, when she moved with her granddaughter from Newport Beach almost ten years ago.

When Johanna first entered the small coffee shop, which Mags and Annie, the granddaughter lived above; she was overwhelmed by the smell of freshly grounded coffee, vanilla, sea salt and The Rat Pack playing leisurely in the background.

Mags had greeted her with a smile, and when she had pulled out her phone to list the orders given, the old woman had chuckled softly and asked which department of the Chronicle. Surprised, Johanna had told her local news, and Mags and the barista, a cute guy with blonde hair easily made the ten coffees in a little less than five minutes.

Since then, Johanna has enjoyed her frequent trips to The Fourth, often chatting with Mags and Peeta while she waits.

 **[SMS to Finn]** `i swear 2 god they think im their secretary```

‘All ready dear.’ Mags calls, causing Johanna to look up from her phone.

‘Thanks Mags.’ She slips her hand through the coffee holder, something she had never seen before and something Mags claimed Annie had invented.  Each one held coffee like a six pack, and made it so much easier for someone to carry multiple coffees on the multiple runs one had to do. ‘You’re the best.’

Mags chuckles and waves as Johanna leaves the shop.

It’s not for another hour and a half that Johanna checks her phone, with no messages from Finnick.

 **[SMS to Finn]** `y the fuck did i leave la 4 this?`

 

* * *

 

The sign is small, in neat cursive writing:

> _Annie Cresta_
> 
> _TA for 18.01 Calculus, 18.3 Applied Mathematics and 18.781 Theory of Numbers._
> 
> _Office Hours Tuesday 2pm-4pm, or Friday 11am-1pm or by appointment._

She has worked so hard to get to this point, and she is so proud that she has her own office, her own office hours and she even doesn’t mind the fact that it is incredibly tiny, with a view of the parking lot and she spends most of her time grading papers. Numbers make sense.

Numbers make much, much more sense than people do. If something is off in the final answer, you just look back and find the variable that is wrong, that is off and you can redo the entire equation. People are not like that.

People hide their equations, and if something does not add up, there is no way of going back and redoing everything to get a desired result.

It’s incredibly frustrating, because social cues are rather hard for to pick up. And she hates confrontation, so she’s never quite sure if her saying no comes across too subtly.

The knock on her open office door makes her jump, and causes her green eyes to go wide from behind her glasses.  Richard Gloss, a PhD student in aerospace engineering sticks his head into her office.

‘Ready for the team meeting Anne?’

She hates being called Anne, and has told the blonde man, head of the team she’s on, several times. She has yet to decide if he is ignoring her or generally never hears her say “Annie.”

They stroll through the halls of M.I.T towards the booked conference room, with Gloss talking a majority of the time about an assortment of things: his sister Casandra-‘But everyone calls her Cashmere-‘ clothing line and how she is about to have her first Fashion Week in New York, the weather, how everything is now pumpkin flavoured and he loves it.

She has noticed that Gloss never talks to her about work, preferring to talk about hobbies or interests, and Annie has described herself as a rather boring girl, thus creating a stalemate.

When she finally told Gloss she loved to swim, he seemed surprised and rarely mentioned it. She supposed he knew nothing about competitive swimming.

They’re almost outside of the conference room when Gloss slows down and crosses his arms, almost nervously.

‘Say, what are you doing after this? I was thinking about swinging by Muddy Charlie’s for a drink.’

‘Oh.’ Annie says, ‘I have plans.’

Grandma and her are going to try a new recipe for the gingerbread cookies at the store tonight, Peeta is supposed to be there, and maybe even the mysterious Katniss, if Peeta can drag her away from studying.

‘Next time then.’ Gloss says cheerfully, after what she is pretty sure was an awkward pause.

Annie nods.

 

* * *

 

It is almost ten, and she is late.

Incredibly so.

She promised Peeta that she would only be at the library until nine,  but she has completely lost track of time.

She’s now running, with her laptop hitting her back in a painful rhythm and her arms full of textbooks.

She is almost at her destination when she bumps into someone.

‘Shit sorry.’ Katniss swears, rolling back on the well-worn heels of her ankle boots. ‘Gale?!’

It can’t be him. Because why the hell would Gale Hawthorne be out of New York?

Fuck, why the hell would Gale Hawthorne be out of Detroit?

Because she knows Gale Hawthorne and he may bitch and he may whine about how Detroit is a dead man’s town, but he’s a hometown boy. And if Detroit didn’t suit the hollowed look on his face, then New York City did.

Cambridge isn’t the place for people like Gale, or like herself for that matter.

‘Hey Katnip.’  And yes, there is no denying the thin man with dark hair, and a grim deposition. This is Gale Hawthorne.

This is the boy-man, who was two years older than her, but was held back a year. This is the boy who drew skylines and buildings instead of graffiti.

She knew he was in Cambridge, Peeta told her that Gale came into the coffee shop and bought coffee every day. She just never thought she would see him.

‘Gale. Hi.’ Her mouth runs dry then, and it’s odd. Because she was pretty sure she loved him when she was nineteen.

But at twenty they never talked, and now at twenty-two she’s engaged.

‘How are you?’ She says finally.

It shouldn’t be this hard.  But it feels hard talking to him.

She thinks there should be a rule. It should never be hard to talk to someone if you have had their dick in your mouth.

‘I’m good.’ Gale nods, ‘You?’

‘Good.’ Her phone buzzes, and she knows she has to go, because she doesn’t want to be even more late. ‘I gotta go, but you should come over for dinner next week.’

‘You sure?’ His eyebrows are raised, and her phone buzzes again.

‘Yeah, totally. My number’s still the same, so just text me when you’re free and we’ll do dinner.’ She says quickly, glancing down at her phone.

 **[SMS from Peeta]** `Where are you??`

 **[SMS from Peeta]** `Are you ok??`

‘Alright…’ he says, looking at her oddly, but she doesn’t have time to think about it. Instead she waves goodbye, and continues running, while juggling her phone.

**[SMS to Peeta]** `almost here.`

**[SMS to Peeta]** `ran in2 gale.`

**[SMS to Peeta]** ` hes coming over 4 dinner next week.`

She’s worried when Peeta doesn’t respond instantly, like he usually does. Maybe he’s mad at her.

But she doesn’t think about it, because right when she knocks on the door to the apartment overtop of the coffee shop, it opens.

Annie is a very petite girl, if it was polite, Katniss would describe her as the type of girl who like a starving waif. She is very slender and small, maybe five foot in height but not much more. She has long dark brown hair which has soft waves, the type people pay a lot of money for, and very green eyes.

‘You must be Katniss.’ Annie says, letting her in.

 

* * *

 

The old man has a look of disapproval over top of his whisky malt.

‘Don’t hate me because I’m beautiful.’ He calls over his shoulder to his advisor, before signalling for a second beer.

‘Beauty don’t last forever.’ Haymitch warns him, and Finnick laughs, his green eyes glittering in the dark lighting of the pub.

‘Good thing I’ve got my wit and charm.’  He winks, ‘Thanks Becca.’

The bartender smiles in the way he knows, and her cheeks are a bit pink.  She’s trying not to picture him naked, and the way his long lean fingers wrap around the bottle how it would feel on his body.

‘Jesus Finn lay off.’ Haymitch says, and there is disgust laced in the old man’s voice.  ‘I like this bar.’

Maybe it’s unorthodox to have their advising meetings in the bar, five minutes away from campus. But Haymitch hates his office, and well he’s never going to turn down a beer.

‘And if you fuck the staff, you’re never gonna call them back and you’ll get banned from the bar and so will I by proxy.’ Haymitch continues.

‘I call them back.’ He repeats indignantly, and he does try. But sometimes they don’t leave their number, or sometimes he loses their number. They’re all adults here, and making adult decisions.

And he doesn’t really want any commitment.

Commitment is fucking terrifying.

‘You’re gonna have a parental suit on your hands someday.’

He chocks on his beer. ‘Fuck no.’

Kids are even more terrifying that commitment. He’s twenty-six, not thirty-seven.

And it’s not like he’s ever going to fall in love.

Finnick Odair has sworn an oath to never fall in love, to never get married and to never have kids.

Love is never guaranteed, marriage ends in divorce and then you have a seven year old kid spending weekends at Holmby Hills and week days at Bel Air, while Mom finds another rich husband, as socialites are wont to do, and Dad hooks up with the never ending string of actresses trying to get their big break.

Not the best environment for any kid.

And Finnick Odair got all of Daniella Easterby’s looks, with Jonathon Odair’s charm. As well as inheriting the shrewdest minds in all of California.

His genetics are made for bad news, like hell he’s passing it on.

Haymitch barely blinks at his outburst, but instead slides a manila envelope to him.

‘What’s this?’ He says, skimming the papers.

‘Your new case study.’

‘It’s a bunch of newspaper and insurcane claims from over ten years ago.’ Finnick says, staring at his advisor. ‘There’s no case here. No lawsuit, nothing.’

‘Ya sure?’

 

* * *

 

The one bedroom apartment has brick exposed and a fire place. There are vinyl records on the wall behind the overstuffed sofa and a knitted throw that he knows. It used to cover Katniss’s bed in high school.

He’s almost ninety-nine percent sure Peeta decorated the entire place in darker shades of blue and red, because he knows Katniss doesn’t have a finesse bone in her body, and he can see quiet easily what Peeta decorated and what Katniss did.

Peeta chose and placed the bookshelves, but Katniss placed the books, the knickknacks and the pictures, unevenly and in random grouping that doesn’t make a lick of sense.

Katniss chose the coffee table, because it’s simple, it’s there and it does its job, but Peeta is the one who ordered the magazines and puts the remotes and game controllers back in the wicker basket.

Their apartment is the amalgamation of two very different people and somehow in the cacophony of their difference they’ve made a symphony.

It’s not jealousy that makes his mouth feel bitter, and the food-made by Peeta, but Katniss cleaned the fish, and she stirred the pasta sauce so that has to count for something- taste rotten.

This was a mistake.

He thought he was going to be clever, coming over with the rum he and Katniss drunk on the school roof, and calling her “Katnip”, he was going to rub it in, that no matter what he was always her first.

That Katniss always loved Gale before she loved Peeta.

But it’s not working.

It’s not working because they exchange these weird looks when they think he isn’t looking, and Katniss starts humming some old song and stops absentmindedly, and Peeta starts tapping his toes to the rhythm.

It’s not working because he can see bridal magazines out in the office, and a growing invitation list and to do list because they have yet to find a venue.

It’s quite clear in this moment that Gale Hawthorne has not been very clever.

And stopped being very clever the moment he drove Prim Everdeen home that one night while he was wasted.

Katniss is with Peeta.

And it looks like she will never look at him that way again.

 

* * *

 

 

The best thing about being an adult, and being engaged is that holidays means there is always someone to be with you.

It also means that you can be very lazy with Halloween costumes, and that makes Peeta very happy. They’re being Luigi and Daisy, which basically amounts to a dollar star tiara, and a yellow dress for Katniss and green overall and a trucker hat for himself.

It took them ten minutes to get everything sorted for Katniss’s law school mixer, the night before.

And if Katniss ever gets out of the bathroom, they might make it in time.

He checks his emails, knowing they will be within the half hour late ballpark, because Katniss is useless with makeup, and even though she doesn’t need it, the one time he offered to help her, she threw a hairbrush at him.

 **To:** Peeta

 **From:** Mom

 **Subject:** Engagement

 **Sent:** Wednesday October 30 20XX

`Peeta,`

`Your brothers tell me you are still engaged to the Everdeen girl, despite me specifically telling you last July that you needed to break up with her.`

`She’s from Livernois Ave, and you know what happens there. She probably “pimped” herself out tog et a fix.`

`I told you Peeta. I told you to break up with that girl the minute you met her again in New York City, and you didn’t listen.`

`And now what are you doing?`

`You’re working at a coffee shop. We spent all that money to get you to go into Art School, because your father said that you would be good at it.`

`And you throw away any chance of promise of a career for that little slut.`

`You disgust me Peeta.`

`Don’t come home anymore. I won’t see you.`

‘Is everything okay?’ He’s jarred from the email, and looks up from his MacBook to see Katniss frowning at him slightly, her hair out of the ever present braid into something he would bet, is trying to imitate Annie’s waves.

‘Yeah.’ Peeta lies, ‘Just spam. I can enlarge my manhood with three small payments of seven eighty-four a month.’

Katniss laughs, and her fingers brush his crotch. ‘You’re pretty big already though.’

‘And that is why I love you.’ He grins into her hair, his arms tightening around her. ‘That’s why I love you.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is chapter two!
> 
> Thank you for all the hits, the kudos, the comments and the bookmarks. It makes me all glowy inside to know there are so many people interested in this little world that I created.
> 
> If you have any questions, feel free to check out my tumblr: seevikifangirl where I will answer all the questions if there are any there. I don't want to do that in the comments, in case it spoils something for them.
> 
> Also the ages of people currently:  
> Peeta and Katniss: 22, because they both finished university in April of the year.  
> Annie and Gale: 24  
> Johanna and Finnick: 26
> 
> I played with canon age, because Johanna won the 71st game, which means she and Finnick could not possibly be the same age, as if he won the 65 at 14 that means he was 19 when Annie won the 70th and 21 when Johanna won.
> 
> It's rather small, but the fact that people keep on saying in fics that Finnick and Johanna are the same age or Finnick and Annie are the same age just annoys me.
> 
> They can't be. At all.
> 
> The closest age difference would be, Finnick a year old than Annie who is a year older than Johanna. That's the closest.
> 
> So why do people put them all in the same age? I have never, never understood that.
> 
> Anyway, sorry for the rant. I hope you enjoyed this!
> 
> I will see you soon,
> 
> V


	3. November, of the first year

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In my twenties, I was a huge, insane risk-taker.  
> ~James Ransone

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Anna who listened to my theories  
> For Samarra who pushed me in  
> For Thea who encouraged me  
> For Sara who has been my rock  
> For Liana who finds me Annie/Finnick stories

November, in Johanna’s humble opinion, is the worst month in the year. All the pumpkin spice is gone, and there is the time when she never knows if she can wear her nice fall boots, or her nice winter boots.

The weather never makes up its mind, and so she dresses in layers.

And layers make her look fat.

She hates November with a huge passion.

The only good thing about November in Cambridge is that The Fourth has pumpkin spice available all year long, and Mags has not a problem with giving her pumpkin spice latte three shots of expresso for no charge.

She’s a life saver, and the woman has become her role model, despite not saying much.

From Peeta, the blonde barista with blue eyes, who makes her think of farm boys back home, she’s heard that Mags has a granddaughter, around her own age. She’s studying math at MIT, and on a research team.

She’s never seen the mysterious Annie, and it’s surprising because she comes here on her days off to get coffee.

She has seen the very good looking man with dark hair who scowls at everyone but Mags when he orders his coffee, and sits in the corner, glowering tapping away at his tablet.

‘How is the news today?’ Mags asks her.

‘Boring.’ Johanna answers, looking at Mags again. Her hair is more silver than grey, and the small lines around her face make her look much younger than she actually is. She always wears dresses, breezy ones, that remind Johanna of the beach and the sun, and looks very out of place in Cambridge. ‘The most intresting thing was a fender bender out at the mall.’

Mags laughs. ‘The one thing I don’t miss from Newport is the traffic. Cambridge is much slower.’

It’s odd, hearing Mags talk about her life before Cambridge. Even more, hearing Newport. Johanna was born and raised in Roseville, Minnesota, but she left for California as soon as possible, and she watched _The OC_.

She knows Newport Beach is somewhere the affluent families in California live, and she knows that people don’t leave unless they have to.

And it is not her place to pry, but why the hell is Mags who dresses for the beach and still smells of sea salt in Cambridge?

She’s deep in thought, so she doesn’t notice her surroundings as she turns. But she does notice when her large pumpkin spice latte with three shots of expresso is sloshing onto the chrome of a tablet, schorching her skin and the shirt of the scowling, grumping asshole who is not the corner anymore.

‘Fuck.’ She hisses, almost dropping the cup, but managing to keep her grip. ‘Fucking shit.’

‘Goddamnit.’ The scowling man mutters. ‘My fucking tablet.’ He glares at her, like it’s all her fault.

She sneers back. ‘Watch where you’re going bastard.’

‘I was bitch.’ He snaps back, wiping coffee off his tablet. ‘Fuck.’

She watches him power it off, and then attempt to power it back on. ’Fuck.’ He curses again.

‘That’s what you get when you get PC.’ She snips, switching her coffee to her other hand, shaking her arm furiously, trying to get the liquid out of her blouse sleeve.

‘Fuck you.’ He growls. ‘I don’t have fucking time for this.’

Johanna smirks, while Mags and Peeta watch amused. Or rather Mags seems amused, Peeta looks a bit worried.

Weird.

The asshole gingerly holds his tablet with one hand, and pulls out a business card in one hand and hands it to her.

‘What?’

‘Give me your card. I have places to go. I’ll call you so we can talk about reimbursing me.’

Johanna’s eyebrow is raised.

‘Why the fuck would I do that? It’s your own fucking fault.’

The asshole makes a face like he wants to protest, but his phone-a Samsung one, the one the size of her face beeps.

‘Fucking bitch.’ He says, not under his breathe at all, and begins to head out of the shop.

‘Her name is Johanna Mason.’ Mags calls after him, ‘You need to use the google her up!’

‘Mags!’

Mags doesn’t even look guilty as she hands her a brand new pumpkin spice latte with three shots of expresso, and gently shoves her out the door.

She gets her revenge by making faces in the window while Peeta mops up her mess.

Sighing, she takes her phone and easily calls Finnick.

_‘I’m kinda busy at the moment Jo.’_

She scoffs, it’s two in the afternoon on a Sunday. The only type of busy he has is the type where he’s eating the y, or something like that.

‘Yeah right Finn. Look I just had the most fucking shittiest experience at the coffee shop ever.  The hot asshole who’s always there right? Yeah so he was fucking close behind me and I spilt my coffee on him and his fucking PC shit. Who the fuck uses PC?’ Johanna continues on, walking down the street.  ‘And he has the audacity to go “Well you’ve gotta fucking pay for my shitty as PC tablet where I play angry birds because I am that much of a fucking hipster.”’

 _‘I thought hipsters used Mac._ ’ Finnick says distantly.

‘Everyone uses Mac. A true hipster uses PC now, and plays Angry Birds because Candy Crush is way too mainstream.’ Johanna says, ‘Anyway he gave me his fucking card. His card. Like if you are fucking rich enough to have a business card, you are fucking rich enough to buy your own goddamn tablet.’

_‘Mhmm.’_

‘Are you even listening to me Finn?’

‘No.’ He says bluntly. ‘I told you I’m busy. Look you did spill coffee on his tablet. So just buy him a coffee the next time you’re at the damn shop. You’re there often enough.’

‘But-‘

Finnick hangs up then, and Johanna glares at her phone angrily before shoving it in her pocket.

She takes one look at the business card.

> **Gale Hawthorne**
> 
> **Junior Architect**
> 
> **McCullogh and Associates**

Johanna tosses it on the sidewalk.

* * *

 

‘We’re not going back to Detroit.’ Peeta says firmly, over the salmon with lemon glass rice over they’re having for dinner.  He has a beer and Katniss has a cooler.

They both hate wine, him because that is his mother’s drink of choice. And Katniss because wine was something that came out of a box in Detroit, and it has the same connotations Detroit has for her.

‘Where else are we going for Thanksgiving then?’ She asks, looking over the salad bowl at him. ‘New York?’

‘Sure.’  He says easily, ‘We can get a hotel, see the sites. Play tourist.’

‘Peeta I want to go home.’

He sighs. ‘Do you mean Detroit or do you just want to see Prim and your Mom again?’

He doesn’t want to step foot in Detroit ever again.

He hates it and loves it all at the same time. Detroit is where he first met Katniss, in kindergarten, before he knew what gangs were and before crack and drugs and drive byes were just words not threats he heard on the news.

In Detroit all he is is the third Mellrak boy, the weird painting kid. The guy people like, but always passes by.

‘My Mom and Prim.’ Katniss says easily and quickly. ‘Detroit isn’t as important.’

‘Then we should have them over here.’

* * *

 

Its a few days later, when Katniss comes breathless into the coffee shop, her dark eyes wild, and one hand griping tightly to her phone, the other hand on a file folder for school.

‘Where are we going to put them?!’ She says frantically, while Peeta changes the coffee grinds.

‘Who?’

Mags takes a ceramic mug and begins to make peppermint tea for Katniss.

‘My mom and Prim!’ She says, thrusting her phone into Peeta’s face.

He can see her phone screen.

 **[SMS Prim]** `cant wait 2 c u!!!`

 **[SMS Prim]** `mom is rly xcited 2`

 **[SMS Prim]**  `:) :) :)`

‘We can put them on the couch.’ Peeta suggests, but the glare on Katniss’s face makes him backtrack quickly. ‘Or…um…we can take the couch?’

‘What’s wrong dear?’ Mags asks, discreetly pushing the tea in Katniss’s direction.

‘Our apartment is only one bedroom and there is no place we can put my mom and my sister and cook Thanksgiving dinner!’  Katniss tells Mags distractedly, accepting the tea. ‘I can’t believe we didn’t think about this at all! We don’t even know how to cook a turkey or the stuffing or the…fuck what else is it? Cranberry sauce!’

‘That’s why they have Google.’ He says soothingly, moving from behind the counter to in front of her, and holding her forearms reassuringly. ‘We can look it up, and it’ll be fine.’

‘No it’s not!’ She insists, and he can hear a small tinge of hysteria. ‘We’re supposed to be adults, because we’re hosting _Thanksgiving_ and I don’t even know if our oven is in Fahrenheit or Celsius!’

‘It’s Fahrenheit.’ Mags says, and there’s the beginnings of a smile on her face.  ‘And I have a solution, why don’t you, Peeta, your mother and your sister come join Annie and I for Thanksgiving? We have more than enough space and it’s just the two of us.’

‘What about Annie’s parents?’ Peeta asks, while Katniss gapes at Mags surprised by the offer.

A shadow crosses Mags face, but it’s gone quicker than Peeta and Katniss can comment on it. ‘Marina, my daughter, died of leukemia when Annie was five.  Annie’s father was never involved.’

‘I’m sorry.’ Peeta murmurs.

Mags smiles at him forgivingly. ‘Don’t be dear, it’s been a long time and you didn’t know. But with just the two of us, it can get a bit somber. I think Annie would love to have the company.’

‘Are you sure?’ Katniss asks finally, she doesn’t want  to impose, but The Fourth is a renovated Victorian style house, and she has seen the space they have.

‘I insist.’

And just like that, Katniss and Peeta get invited to Thanksgiving with the Crestas.

* * *

 

He swears to god, or Thor that he is sleeping in his office more than he’s slept in his own bed. It sucks balls.

And it sucks balls even more is that no one has sucked his balls in almost five days.

Not since Haymitch set three gigantic binders, about three inches wide each and packed until their bursting and told him that he needed a comprehensive report of the last twenty-five years on the health and safety legislative changes from the company.

And he needs by November Thirtieth.

Finnick didn’t miss when he tossed the little smiling yellow stress ball at Haymitch’s head.

He has been working around the clock, only managing to hit the pool and the gym three times a week, because the rest of the time he’s teaching Law 101, working on his own thesis, stuck with office hours, where one first year who failed his midterm, promised to suck his dick if he passed her, and finally work on the report.

Twenty-five years of private company policy health and safety legislative is a lot.

And for some reason there have been large revisions every two or three years , as well as a great big overhaul of all the companies policies about ten years ago. They basically destroyed all the existing policies and built everything new from the ground up.

His phone rings, and he checks the caller ID. It’s Johanna.

He’s already missed three calls from her this week; she’ll skin him alive if he misses another.

‘Hey.’

 _‘Finally. Goddamn Finn, the point of having a phone is that you actually answer it._ ’ She says crossily. _‘What am I supposed to do? Hire a messenger pigeon.’_

‘If you’re doing that I want an unladen swallow.’ He quips, scanning over a document for the fourth time today.

_‘What?’_

‘Never mind.’ He reaches for the pink highlighter, he’s assigned for unnatural language, and highlights a sentence. ‘What’s up?’

_‘Nothing…just thinking about Thanksgiving. What are your plans?’_

‘Trying to get home. ‘He says, scanning it again. ‘Dad’s having Thanksgiving cocktail party Saturday night, and Mom’s trying to have an all American family dinner, because her new fuck buddy doesn’t know how fucked up we are.’

 _‘Oh.’_ Johanna says faintly, and he nods, before remembering they aren’t facetiming, but instead actually on the phone.

‘Yeah. How ‘bout you?’ He asks, not really listening as he caps the highlighter. ‘Any plans?’

 _‘Nothing really.’_ Johanna says.

He swivels in his chair, to where his MacBook is resting on the window sill, letting his desk be covered with all the papers, to do a quick search.  ‘Cool. Jo, I’ll call you back okay? Right now I just gotta get this report done.’

 _‘Yeah, it’s cool.’_ She echoes.

‘Awesome. Talk to you later.’  He ends the call, reaches for his coffee and adjusts his glasses.

This will be a long day.

* * *

 

His car, his nice black sports car is sitting in his garage, back at Cambridge.

He drove eight hundred miles Wednesday night straight to Detroit in a rented sedan that’s so non-descript and boring no one would want to steal it.

He’s home. It smells like smoke, garbage, and poverty.

He hates Detroit, but if someone asks him he will say he is a Detroit boy. There’s pride in his disgust, that he was born to be shot or jailed, and somehow he clawed his way out of the streets, and got himself into Columbia, an Ivy League school, something people who don’t have to do illegal things just to pay tuition or feed their families, barely get into either.

He did it.

All by himself.

But the cracked asphalt and the dirty houses on the street he rode bikes on as a child feel wrong, and old, and the Seven-Eleven at the corner where he dealt crack and pills has a going out of business sign masking taped off center to the door.

Everything has changed, but it barely has.

His old phone buzzes, the one with the Detroit number that he keeps for nostalgia and to keep the dealers away from Rory or Vick or Posy.

 **[SMS 313XXXXXXXX]** `u back in town?`

He ignores it.

He’s not the boy who dealt anymore to make sure they paid their bills.

He’s an architect. Who is done paying off his student loans, and is now paying off his mortgage.

And from the way everything feels foreign to him, he doesn’t think he’s a Detroit boy any longer.

* * *

 

 There isn’t anything more pathetic then not having anyone to come home to for the holidays.

Except, maybe spending Thursday night in a coffee shop, because Finnick left this morning, and the coffee shop feels more like home than the empty apartment, and maybe if she pretends Mags can be her grandma, and Peeta her annoying little brother.

‘Why are you still here?’ Her eyes fly open, and Peeta is leaning on a broom, pausing from the nightly cleaning. ‘Most people are on their way home.’

She is very proud she doesn’t wince when Peeta says home. Home has connotations, like family, like Mom and Daddy and the stupid little brother. And the puppy.

Family has connotations too, like _“I’m so sorry Johanna, we did everything we could, but we just couldn’t save them.”_

_“Your father was already dead when we got there.”_

_“He was so young, it’s such a shame that he died.”_

_“She didn’t sign her organ donor card…but as the only surviving next of kin, will you consent?”_

‘Haven’t you heard Blondie? I’m a rebel.’ It comes out much more harsher than she expected, and she almost begins to apologize when she realizes Peeta doesn’t wince.

‘I’m not going back either.’  He says, and there’s not a drop of pity in his voice, but a tone of understanding.

She wants to hit him.  He doesn’t get to be understanding, because he doesn’t understand.

And Johanna realizes that understanding feels worse than pity, because it makes you feel naked, and while she has no problem going around naked, in fact she and Finn often have a no clothes rule in the summer, being naked of the emotional variety is far from her favourite thing to do.

‘Katniss’s mom and her sister are coming up and we’re going to Mags for Thanksgiving.’

‘Sounds like a lifetime movie.’ She says sarcastically, standing and stretching. It’s not like Peeta is in the same situation as her anyway. She will bet the entire contents of her bank account, which is not a lot because she is still paying off student loans that Peeta’s entire family were not killed by a drunk driver.

‘Will you be joining us for that lifetime movie?’ Mags asks, her eyes twinkling.

Johanna freezes, ‘What?’

‘Lifetime movies always have such a predictable cast don’t they?’ Mags continues, ‘The feeble old Granny, the tired Mom. The lovers, the little sister, the shy middle daughter, and the sarcastic big sister. All we’re missing is the big sister.’

‘I…’She barely has time to protest, when Mags steamrolls on.

‘Annie will be thrilled; she’s been baking all week. This is the first big Thanksgiving we’ve had in a while. Come over Saturday at around two, you don’t need to bring anything.’ Mags prattles on, and Johanna can’t get a word in otherwise.

All she can think is that whoever called Mags feeble, has never actually met her.

* * *

 

She’s prompt, standing outside the side door that acts as the front door for Mags’s house. She’s dressed nicely, because she doesn’t know how to dress for these functions anymore, and she’s brought three bottles of wine.

She’s afraid to ring the bell, but its cold outside so she does, and Johanna almost immediately regrets it, but the green wooden door is swung open instantly and a pretty blonde teenager is looking up at her expectantly.

‘Hi, you must be Johanna.’ She smiles.

Johanna nods, ‘Annie?’ She highly doubts it, because this girl bears no resemblance to Mags in the slightest, but she hasn’t the foggiest idea who she could be.

‘Nope!’ The girl says laughing, popping the “p” ‘I’m Prim. Katniss’s sister.’

‘Right.’ She says, entering the house, and noticing the Victorian influence décor, before a grand staircase leads them up. She can smell turkey and hear the soft lull of conversation and laughter. ‘Blondie’s girlfriend.’

‘Fiancée.’ Prim corrects her, skipping up the stairs, ‘But yeah.’

‘Johanna! You came!’ Mags smiles, leaving the stove where she had been instructing Katniss how to stir something, to hug her briefly. ‘And you brought wine! Oh how lovely, you didn’t have to do that!’

‘Least I could do.’ Johanna shrugs, before the blonde woman the splitting image of Prim introduces herself.

She wanders to the kitchen where she puts the Riseling and the Gewurztaminer fridge, where she bumps into a small girl in an oversized knit sweater with her dark wavy hair in a ponytail, decorating cookies.

‘Hi.’ Johanna says awkwardly. ‘Annie?’

‘Yeah.’ The girl blinks, before getting back to outlining sugar cookies with pale blue icing. ‘You must be Johanna.’

She nods, and the conversation dies. It’s awkward there, so she leaves.

In the dining room, she accepts a glass of red wine from Mrs. Everdeen, and falls into a conversation about the new iPhones that came out.

* * *

 

Its several hours later, after dinner in which Annie isn’t present and there’s a sad look in Mag’s eyes that Johanna steps into the library to grab a quick smoke. She noticed the balcony on the tour of the house, and finds it to be the perfect place to nip out.

Its freezing and she regrets not getting her leather jacket, but it’s over the back of her chair, and she’s too lazy to go get back it.

‘Oh shit.’  She almost drops the unlit cigarette, huddled in the corner clutching a bottle of Pino Noir is Annie Cresta, with tear streaks down her face.

Annie looks up when the French double doors are pushed open, and the dark haired woman with a blunt bob cut, strolls out, a cigarette dangling from her teeth.

She clutches the neck of the bottle of wine closer, as if it is a shield.

‘Are you okay?’ Johanna asks her, and she blinks, before pulling the sleeve of her sweater over her palms, and trying to wipe the tears away.

‘Yeah.’ She lies, because she should be okay.

Everything was going perfectly fine, until she checked Facebook, right before dinner. And she saw him, smiling holding a beer at a bonfire on the beach, his arm wrapped some girl who looks too much like her.

And it’s just like she’s fourteen, sneaking out to a bonfire on the beach and Marvel’s smiling at her, giving her vodka and coke, never letting her drink run out and why didn’t she fight back harder, why didn’t she scream.

She said no.

Didn’t she?

She takes another swig of wine, focusing on the warm spice hitting the back of her throat. She’s not on the beach, she’s not in Newport, she’s in Cambridge, and she’s on the balcony and Johanna Mason is looking at her like she understands.

But she doesn’t.

Johanna fumbles with her lighter, ‘Do you mind?’

She shakes her head, and they sit in silence where Johanna smokes and she drinks.

‘Why you hiding up here?’ Johanna asks, after a few minutes. ‘Aren’t you hungry?’

‘…Don’t like crowds.’ She says, staring at the label on the bottle.

‘Me either.’ Johanna says shortly.  ‘Too loud.’

‘…Too many people.’ Annie admits, drinking again.

Johanna pauses, and flicks the ash off the end of her cigarette, watching the ashes drifts from the balcony flickering until they die when they hit the side walk. ‘So what’s your damage? You’re like three steps from AA.’

She’s silent for more than five minutes, pulling the label off the bottle of wine, folding and unfolding it.

‘People are scary. Too many…in one room…and I don’t know them all.’ She says finally, looking at Johanna. ‘It makes me…want to run. And…’ she falls silent.

‘How about you?’

Johanna mulls over the question, lighting another cigarette. ‘I don’t do family things.’

Annie looks at her, and Johanna sighs. ‘My family died when I was in first year, right before I went home for Thanksgiving.  So family shit isn’t really my thing.’

They fall into silence, and it’s almost comfortable.

There’s something about the harsh lines of Johanna that hides some of the noise of the bonfire and the waves in her head.

She can quite firmly pin herself to reality, not reliving that night.

‘It sucks.’ She says quietly.

‘Yeah.’ Johanna agrees, staring at the streetlights. ‘Yeah it does.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is some of the backstory being laid out. 
> 
> I can already feel people not liking how things had to be changed to fit into this AU. But please, please remember that if this is set in Modern Day, aka like last month there is no reason why Katniss and Gale would be hunting for food.
> 
> I mean I have read some stories, where they're rednecks who have accents and go shooting down south, but I wanted to put them into Detroit, and in Detroit, they'd be dealing rather than hunting for deer.
> 
> For people wondering when the romance is coming, it's coming. I'm someone who likes having ground work laid down, and having couples grow gradually.
> 
> I think it's unrealistic to see someone, fall in love with someone, and then have everything be hunkydory. Relationships take work, and everyone has to work for them. There is a reason why Peeta and Katniss are together at the start of this story, and yes I do know how everything will end, and what will be considered endgame. No, it will not change. No I will not tell you, unless you are one of people this is dedicated to because they already know.
> 
> Please remember that you can love someone but not be with them. 
> 
> As always, my tumblr is seevikifangirl, and I am more than willing to answer any questions about this here.
> 
> Thank you for reading the chapter, this long huge note, thank you for all the kudos, comments, bookmarks and subscriptions. I hope you have a great new year, and I will see you then.
> 
> All the best,  
> V


	4. December, the first year.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I look back on my 20s. It’s supposed to be the prime of your life, the most vital, the most beautiful. But you’re making your critical decisions and sometimes your most critical mistakes.   
>  \- Ann Brashares

She doesn’t understand her head sometimes, because it’s so contradictory. Crowds are her enemy, too many people, too close for her to breathe. Crowds make her feel like drowning, but Christmas crowds, which should be a million times worse, make her feel like she’s walking on air.

It doesn’t make sense, there are three times as many people in the malls, and everyone has short tempers, and really with her social anxiety she should just buy things online.

But no, Annie loves Christmas shopping.  She loves wearing the new black heeled boots she bought on Black Friday, also something that she should not have been able to do, she loves wearing the grey peacoat with the red scarf that was her mother’s once upon a time.

It’s like a hunt, she has a list of items she has to buy for people, a bigger list this time because it’s grown to include Johanna who is grumbling into her coffee as they battle crowds to get into Macy’s, Peeta, and his girlfriend.

She likes this hunt, because she knows what she wants, and she knows she will get it.

She wonders if the thrill of the hunt is what is combatting the anxiety of crowds. She likes to think it is, because the other option is that right now, at this moment Annie Cresta is just a normal twenty-four year old girl, clearing out her bank account.

Normality is her end goal in life, to get back who she was at fifteen. Sometimes she thinks she’s reached it, when she’s TAing, or shopping, or watching Netflicks with Johanna. Other times, she can’t leave the bathtub because she’s going to have go outside and there are people there, and they will hurt and her heart is beating too loud and she keeps on thinking, and she can’t keep up and-

No.

Breathe, deep breathes.

Annie’s small smile is back before Johanna can comment on the loss of it, and she points out a pair of boots that fit Johanna so well, but she knows the older woman will never buy it herself.  The Jimmy Choo Yule Biker boots are more than Johanna’s rent.

‘What are you doing for Christmas?’ She asks, weaving through the crowd of people, clutching the strap of her bag tightly, while Johanna follows.

She leads them into the shoe department, claiming she needs new boots, Johanna doesn’t protest, she instead flops into one of the waiting chairs grimacing at the prices.

‘I don’t know.’ Johanna says, as Annie tries on booties and inspects the appearance in the mirrors, before making a face and kicking them off. ‘Haven’t really got plans. Might end up going to Finn’s parents.’

‘Finn is your roommate right?’ Annie asks, looking over her shoulder, eyeing the very boots she wants to get Johanna to try one.

She doesn’t miss the softening around Johanna’s eyes, like all of her tension has been released with the mention of Finn’s name.

‘Yeah.’ Johanna says briskly. ‘He’s an idiot.’

‘But your idiot?’ She grins, and there’s a low flush rising on her face. Anne likes the colour on Johanna; it makes her look less scary.

Though if Annie is honest, Johanna has never really been that scary, not since she met her hiding the cigarettes from Annie’s grandmother.

No one can be scary when they’re hiding from Mags.

‘No…not…mine.’ Johanna sputters, and Annie laughs. There’s a shocked look on Johanna’s face, like she’s never heard Annie laugh before, or that she’s never been teased about a boy before.

Annie never teased anyone about a boy before either, she’s not sure what happened to Johanna, but Annie thinks that the older woman might have had a lonely adolescents as well.

‘But you want him to be.’ She waves a salesperson over, pointing to the Jimmy Choos, ‘She’d like to try these on in a size…what size are you?’

‘Eight.’ Johanna answers absentmindedly, before her eyes narrow, ‘No I don’t-‘ The sentence is left unfinished as the sales clerk has left them already, Johanna looks like she is about to scold Annie for what she said, so she pushes on the conversation.

This feels nice, talking about boys. Annie is twenty-four, and has never had a serious boyfriend, not since she was fifteen. She sees on Facebook, and she hears her colleagues at MIT discuss sex, dating, weddings, and babies. Almost none of those appeal to her. She wants the Olympics, and even though that’s a pipe dream, she wants it. She also wants her PhD, and to teach.

Math and swimming calms her, it’s weird she knows.

‘So tell me about him.’ She says, ‘Tell me about this mysterious Finn who has somehow managed to make you fall in love with him.’

The salesclerk is back with the boots that Johanna tries on without protest, her mind running rapidly as she tries to maneuver her way past Annie’s questions.

‘He’s good looking. And he’s a smartass. He never takes anything seriously. He sleeps around with random girls, and he puts too much sugar in anything. He takes over an hour to get ready and he uses up all the hot water.’ Johanna lists, a tiny crease forming between her eyes. ‘He always forgets to charge his phone, and he thinks The Hangover is stupid-‘

‘It is stupid.’ Annie interjects, ‘How do they fit?’

‘Good.’  Johanna says, modelling them in front of the low mirror, before continuing on her train of thought, ‘Finn doesn’t get people don’t like water, or that people need to sleep. Or that asking for directions is an actual thing. He wears those fake glasses, the ones with plastic in the frames, because he thinks it makes him look hotter.’

‘Does it?’ Annie giggles, trying to picture the man Johanna describes as Johanna kicks the boots off, and leaves them haphazardly on the carpeted floor.

‘Yeah.’ Johanna grumbles, done with shoe shopping. ‘Stupid asshole looks good in everything.’

‘Really? I look forward to seeing if he’s as good looking as you say.’ Annie laughs, as they leave the store. There’s a small queue, where small children and their parents are waiting to visit Santa and get the obligatory photo.

‘Oh!’ Annie says, shoving one of the plastic shopping bags containing several new books for Katniss into Johanna’s arms, and practically skipping towards the teenage dressed like an elf and looking like she would do anything else than be here. ‘How much would it be if my friend and I could have a picture with Santa on my phone? I just want that.’

The girl gives her a once over, and Annie gives her a small smile, ‘Honestly I’ll do it for free. Just make it really quick.’

Annie nods, and tells the girl she will be right back, and dragging Johanna through the crowd at neck breaking speed, not giving the other woman time to protest before she shoves her on Santa’s lap, and Annie herself is perched on the green velvet footstool, after handing the elf her iPhone.

‘Alright,’ The girl says, barely glancing at the screen, ‘One, two, three- _cheese_!’

Annie thinks Johanna is still in shock, because of the slightly surprised, very annoyed expression on her face is displayed while she is smiling.

Johanna regains the ability to form sentences a few minutes later while Annie sets the photo as her phone background.

‘What ,’ Johanna starts, before stopping and staring at her, ‘What the fuck was that about?’

‘In high school all the girls talked about taking Santa pictures with their friends,’ Annie says simply, happy with the photo and slipping it into her coat pocket, ‘I always wanted to, but I never got the chance.’

Johanna is quiet then, by the small confession she has given her. Annie doesn’t dwell on it, instead she inspects which shop she wants to go into next.

‘Besides Grandma wants a family photo for Christmas dinner, and I thought it would be adorable.’

* * *

 

There is nothing more relaxing than oil painting, in Peeta’s mind. Unfortunately with their small apartment it’s just not possible for him to use oil paint, the fumes would get everywhere.

Charcoal is the next best thing.

He’s sketching The Fourth, he’s hoping to be finished in time for Christmas to give it to Mags as a present.

He’s doing the shading when his phone rings, and he’s so preoccupied he doesn’t check whose calling.

‘Hello?’

_‘Now you answer the phone you ungrateful son of a bitch.’_

‘Mom.’ He has to put down the charcoal and step away from the easel. He doesn’t want his mother tainting the corner of the apartment designated his art studio.

Hell, he doesn’t want his mother in his apartment.

Or his life.

But that, and the fact that he doesn’t feel that guilty for cutting the woman who gave birth to him out of his life is another matter for another time. And probably going to cost his five hundred dollars every minute he sits on a therapists’ couch working out the very large complicated knot of mother issues.

 _‘Now you remember you have one.’_ His mother’s voice sounds distorted and nasally over the phone lines, he sighs in response. _‘Fat luck of good that did over the holidays. Holidays are time for family, Peeta, and what did you do?’_

‘What did I do Mom?’ he answers monotone, while his mother talks over him.

_‘You stay in that godforsaken town with that gold-digging little slut, and you leave your mother alone? How dare you.’_

‘Mom.’ Peeta interrupts, ‘You disowned me, remember? And secondly Katniss is not a gold-digging little slut. She is my fiancée, and the love of my life. And Mom if you call her that again, I will disown you. I love her, I’m going to marry her that has not and will not ever change. So it would be great if you accepted us, but I know you won’t. So I’ll save paper and I won’t bother with your invitation.’

He’s answered by the dial tone.

Peeta lets out a deep breath and closes his eyes, flopping onto the sofa and cradling his head in his hands.

Great.

The sound of the door locking firmly, jars him from his thoughts, and Katniss stands at the door, her arms crossed like she is shielding herself from his mother’s words.

Even better.

‘Gold-digging little slut.’ Katniss repeats, and his stomach drops with each sylabell, he hurries from the sofa to wrap her up in his arms, but she moves away from him. ‘I knew your Mom hated me, but at least I know what she thinks of me.’

‘Katniss-you know that’s not true.’ Peeta says, watching her face carefully. ‘My mom is…’he trails off unable to find a way to defend his mother, ‘You’re not gold-digging, and you’re not a slut, and don’t let what she says get to you it’s not true.’

‘But it is.’ Katniss insists, her dark eyes flashing. ‘Sort of. You pay for everything!’

‘I have a job.’ He says slowly, trying to calm the fuming woman standing a foot away from him. ‘You’re in law school, which is incredible.’

She doesn’t seem appeased with his words, by the rate she is balling up her woolen mittens and tossing them violently to the ground.

‘Also we have a joint banking account.’ Peeta tries to make light of the situation, but she glares at him, kicking off her winter boots and tosses the ski jacket on the couch haphazardly.

Katniss stomps away into her study, with her laptop in her arms.

Peeta sighs when the door slams shut, before it’s opened a crack and Katniss says, ‘We’re going back to Detroit for Christmas.’, and slamming the door again, louder this time.

‘Great.’

* * *

 

The printer hums as it begins to wake up and systemically print out the hotel reservations for a Disneyland resort.

Gale rubs his temples, he is fighting a combination of cold and migraine that comes with convincing hi mother that Christmas at Disney would be great for their family.

He almost lost that battle, if it weren’t for Posy who looked at them all with stars in her eyes, the way he assumes every ten year old girl does when getting told they can go to Disneyland.

He never wants to go back to Detroit, he doesn’t see a future there for him, or for any of the Hawthornes, and he has not worked this hard to get out of Detroit, to leave his family there.

On Thanksgiving he caught Rory dealing.

It hit him like a freight train, making him numb and furious. He dealt to get money and to get them out of Detroit. Rory seems to deal for the fun of it, not knowing the dangers and the line he’s balancing on.

Everyone loves a dealer until they get a better deal, or the stuff isn’t as good.  And then the dealer’s the enemy, the scapegoat when one gets arrested for possession or using.

He took precautions, never in his neighbourhood, never with his really name. Never to minors, he never pissed anyone off. He played it safe, he kept himself alive and well out of anyone’s target range.

Rory isn’t doing that.

Rory is going to get himself killed.

The only option, only real option, in his mind, is to move his family from Detroit to Cambridge, he’s been looking for small houses and he’s found one.

He has to go to the bank tomorrow to talk about how to finance it properly, and his mother and Rory will hate him. But this keeps Rory off the streets, and it keeps them all from doing something stupid and getting shot.

He has yet to tell his mother, dreading that conversation due to how well Disneyland went over.

Hazelle Hawthorne is a Detroit girl, born and raised. It broke her heart to see him leave Detroit for New York, but she expected him to come back to Detroit.

Detroit is a ghost town, in his mind, there are no jobs and no way to support him family.

He hopes his mother will understand.

* * *

 

He’s seen the flyer up in the grad lounge for the past two weeks; it’s not ingeniously named ‘The Twelve Bars of Christmas’ but a pub crawl is a pub crawl.

And he is only a first year PhD candidate, he needs to show up to these events.

Johanna might want to go, he barely sees her anymore. The long hours trying to figure out what the everloving fuck he is supposed to do with the District 12 manufacturing case that Haymitch has him working on, as well as her new found friendship with the girl from the coffee shop seems to mean they barely see each other.

 **[SMS to Jo]** `Hey, you free Fri. night?`

**[SMS Jo]** ` was going 2 hang with annie. why`

**[SMS to Jo** ]` Bring her.`

Maybe he’ll meet the mysterious  Annie.  He chucks his phone into his bag, and heads to the pre-law class he has to teach, and forgets all about it.

The days from Monday to Friday bleed into each other with coffee, a random woman from the bar, and a whole lot of legal jargon and a trip to the Office Depot to get more highlighters.

It’s about six o’clock Friday, when Johanna jars him from the vast amount of highlighting and correcting he is doing to first year papers, he curses.

He mentally begins his to do list for the night, he needs to shower, shave, and eat. He has three hours, before they will have to grab a cab to get to the first pub. He’s planning on getting thoroughly pissed tonight, well warranted for the amount of work he’s been doing.

He rushes through his routine, gelling his copper golden curls in an artful image of disarray, and he’s still twenty minutes.

‘Finn the cab is here.’  Johanna hollers, her voice ricocheting off the walls that they really need to decorate.

‘I’m coming! Jesus keep your shirt on.’ He yells back, fumbling with his Rolex and thundering down the hall, where Johanna in tight jeans and a bomber jacket waits impatiently. ‘Anxious much?’

He wraps the Burberry scarf around his neck, and he mostly misses the odd display of emotion flit across her face.

‘I’m meeting a bunch of lawyers, who the fuck wouldn’t be nervous?’ She thorws over her shoulder, and leads the way out of their apartment down to the waiting cab.

‘What crime have you done lately Jo?’ He asks, grinning, as the cabbie starts to pull out. ‘Any angry streaking protests?’

She throws her dark head back and laughs. ‘You did that with me! But no, Annie’s coming and I don’t want to keep her waiting.’

He quirks an eyebrow at her, but his best friend doesn’t offer any more words to make anything clear, or at least explain who Annie is.

Parts of him wonder if Johanna has accepted her sexuality and Annie is her girlfriend.

It certainly would make sense, as ever since third year Johanna has never had a relationship with any man last longer than three dates.  He’s been trying subtly to tell her, he will love her no matter what.

The cab ride is silent, and it’s comfortable trudging through the overlysalted sidewalks, to the pub.

At the edge of the pub, he feels himself become Finn Odair, the lovable rouge from a wealthy family, and a resident smart ass. It’s like a second skin by now, skating by on good looks, and the ability to charm a room.

He prefers it.

‘Hel _lo_ ’ he smiles, as a girl, one of the masters students, he forgets her name, but he’s sure it starts with a ‘C’ launches herself at him, kissing him slopplily on the cheek; he’s pulled into the large group of drunk grad students already, and with a glance over his shoulder he can’t find Johanna anywhere.

Ah well, she’s probably finding her girlfriend, and the girl who he needs to remember her name, has her hands running down the waistband of his pants.

* * *

 

He’s not sure what bar they are at when he meets her, but it doesn’t matter does it?

Nothing matters when you’re Finn Odair, potential doctorate in Law, heir to a fortune if no one drinks it away, and the golden boy of Harvard, Berkley and UCLA.

But he meets her, with the pretty blonde hair and the blue eyes that hold all these secrets that he wants to unravel, and her name is Glimmer.

‘Glimmer’ He says, loving the way his tongue hits the top of his mouth when he says her name. She kisses like she needs him, and it’s great.

It’s even better when she takes him home to her place, and lets him fuck her against the wall.

But the best thing comes from the small baggy, Glimmer takes from her bureau drawer, and the white power lines he cuts with his credit card.

And now who the fuck cares about Finn Odair?

* * *

 

It has taken Johanna forty minutes to realize that Annie is not in the first pub, but she texted Johanna saying she had left already.

This means, in the cold December weather there is a lost Annie Crest wandering around Cambridge.

And Mags will never give her caffeinated coffee ever again, if her darling granddaughter gets sick.

And maybe she’s a little bit worried.

But not a lot, because Annie is obviously an adult, and she knows this city pretty well and, well where the fuck is she?

It’s a last resort, and she only remembers it, because over coffee one day Annie mentioned that the pool at MIT is her favourite place in the world, that she goes there.

Her footfalls echo around the heavily chlorinated pool, and she almost turns back.

But huddled against the lifeguard chair, dressed to the nines is Annie Cresta, sobbing her eyes out.

Johanna stops in her track, as the smaller girl hacks out coughs, while still crying, tear tracks ruining the mascara and eyeliner applied in preparation for the event.

She doesn’t do crying. They make her uncomfortable.

‘…Hi.’ Her voice echoes around the pool and Annie jumps.

‘Oh no.’ Annie whispers, covering her face with her hands; trying to make herself even smaller. ‘I’m sorry.’

Her voice cracks and breaks, and Johanna takes several steps forward before stopping shortly, her hands swinging awkwardly at her side.

‘About what?’

Annie’s hands are still covering her face, and her words are muffled, making them harder to hear even with her quiet voice and the strain from crying.

‘Yeah, I can’t hear shit.’ Johanna says, shifting her weight from one foot to the other.

‘…I ruined tonight.’ Annie whispers finally, lowering her handsm and letting Johanna see her redrimmed eyes. ‘It was ‘pposed to be a…fun night an-and I-I I went there. To the pub…and there,’ she hiccups, and the tears come faster, as she fights to be able to form words.

‘There were too many people.’ Annie chokes out finally.

Johanna is silent.                                       

She doesn’t know what to say, or how to explain Annie Cresta.

From the way she avoids crowds-except when shopping, makes her think something bad happened to her when she was a child. She’s not going to press, but whatever it, is making the idea of going out to meet people a petrifying idea.

‘People suck.’ She says finally, kicking off her shoes. ‘They’re not my friends either. They’re Finn’s and Finn probably doesn’t even know I’m gone.’

Annie watches her, calmer now, but her shoulders keep shuddering. Johanna doesn’t know if she’s shaking because she’s still upset, or if she’s just cold.

‘Doesn’t matter. You didn’t ruin tonight so get that idea out of your brain Cresta.’ She says, standing near the edge of the pool.

‘But…’She doesn’t hear the rest of Annie’s protest, because Johanna has jumped into the water, her blue silk top sticking to her like static cling.

When she surfaces, Annie is standing on the edge of the pool, her cocktail dress hitting her knees, staring her confused.

‘I thought you said you liked to swim?’ She calls, smirking at Annie before starting a lap.

She’s almost done half a lap, when she hears the sound of a splash and can see Annie’s dark brown hair expanding like a wave in the pool.

* * *

 

It’s several days after the last day of Hanukkah, but it’s the first night she and Peeta have been back to Detroit, and so Prim, her mother and her ( and Peeta, though Peeta is really just in charge of the latkes) are doing a late celebration.

But first, it’s a stop at the cemetery.

The snow has been falling all day, and so they make fresh tracks, Prim, her mother and her. It’s startling pretty for a place she never likes being in.

_Daniel Everdeen_

_April 17 1967- January 24 2006_

_Count your night by stars, not shadows, Count your life with smiles, not tears._

It’s been years, and the snow, rain and other weather habits have shown a bit of wear for the limestone marker in the far corner of the cemetery.

But the grief, the sadness and the anger that burns through her veins like a drug has not faded away like time.

Her father is gone.

Her family isn’t whole any longer.

It hurts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well this is late.
> 
> I also can't seem to make this chapter work the way I want it.
> 
> But! Things are finally progressing, and I swear to god Annie and Finnick will meet, and other people's relationships are going to get all shook up.
> 
> I was hoping to get this out a lot early, but oh well.
> 
> Also my tumblr is seevikifangirl, if you want to drop by any time, lemme know!
> 
> Thank you for all the comments, subscriptions, kudos and bookmarks; they make my day!
> 
> Love,  
> V


	5. January, the first year

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Make the most of yourself, for that is all there is of you.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It’s been a while, this is a marathon, not a sprint. and Finnick’s character here kept on leaving me.
> 
> Also, this really back story for Annie, and Peeta. It’s moving forward for everyone else.

There is something addicting about parties. The thrill of a bunch of people, the sound of music and the smell of drinks. It’s the best high, and Finnick Odair knows what the best high is. Speaking cynically, he is quite sure he gets his knowledge about highs due to his genetics, but this is not the time to dwell on it.

No, Finnick Odair is making lists on legal pads, screening all his colleagues to make sure the rager he’s throwing in a month is full of people who will make it work.

And maybe get Jo laid.

Unfortunately, there are not a lot of single lesbian lawyers in his peer circle.

And this is important, because Jo is turning twenty-seven, the pinnacle of life changing age. Twenty-five is when you realize you need to sort out your life, and then twenty-six when you get the stability of a job. Twenty-seven is when you start settling down.

And Finnick hasn’t seen Jo go out with anyone for longer than a month, and for the past year he hasn’t seen her date _anyone_. He figures she’s just sorted herself out and she’s trying to let him know they bat for the same team.

He’s known Jo since they were eighteen, and lived on the same floor. She went through her share of guys when they did their undergrad, but started slowing down when she started working as a reporter for the magazine she was at, until finally stopping.  He knows LGBT+ is a delicate topic, he’s gone to seminars on campus, ever since he realized that his best friend was closeted and he’s read a lot of academic literature about it.

But he doesn’t know how to talk about it with Jo, not when she’s being secretive and subtle. Johanna Mason is never subtle, and short of wearing a rainbow speedo an the Pride flag he doesn’t know how to have this conversation.

Finnick sighs and reaches for his coffee and absentmindedly starts shovelling sugar into the mug.

The yellow legal pad with the heading of _V.I.P’s_   has two bullets underneath it: his name and Jo’s.

His office door is kicked open, and Jo’s new boots from her friend Amy grace his doorstep.

‘Hey.’ She says, flinging her bag on his desk and sitting down in the empty hair. ‘Let’s get food.’

‘Hey.’ Finnick says, doodling in the margins. ‘Yeah, sure.’ He stands to grab his wallet and jacket, and at that time Jo sees his list.

‘What’s this?’

‘Birthday party. It’s gonna be crazy.’

Jo follows him out of his office, leaning against the off white wall as he locks his office. ‘I don’t think I want crazy.’

‘What?’ He stares, this is the girl who made that small bar near UCLA stop doing two dollar tequila Tuesday. Jo can drink anyone-even him- under the table.

Johanna shrugs, ‘I dunno. I just think we might have grown up past keg stands and body shots.’

There’s a look of disbelief on his handsome face and he still stares at her. Jo’s  face is dead serious, she’s contemplating the idea of an adult party.

One with wine, cheese and jazz music. It sounds horrible.

‘We’re not twenty-one Finn. I kinda just want to have my friends over at our place.’ Jo continues, leading them to the campus pub. ‘Besides, it’s a lot cheaper than renting a club or whatever you’re thinking of.’

He’s frowning, this isn’t what he wants at all. This is not what he had planned, but it’s her birthday and never let it be said that he doesn’t do what his best friend says.

‘Fine.’ Finnick says, after ordering a turkey club and a half pint. ‘Fine, then who do you want to invite?’

‘My friends.’ Jo takes a sip of her cider.

‘I need names.’ He prompts, and there’s a hard look of concentration that falls on Jo’s face as she tries to name them.

He tries to name them too.

Real friends, not Glimmer or Cato, and he’s stunned that he only has one name on his list. He’s not good at friends, he’s good at people liking him, hell he has over eight hundred Facebook friends, two thousand twitter followers, and two hundred numbers in his phone.

But people he actually wants to spend time with, since getting into law school has dwindled down to just one.

He really should call Thresh sometime.

But Thresh is busy in Afghanistan, fighting this war on terror and he’s not going to be back from his tour for another eight months.

‘Annie.’ Jo says after a long pause. ‘Annie is my friend.’

‘Great party.’ He rolls his eyes, ‘Booze will be cheap. We can get the box wine.’

‘Fuck off.’ There’s no real venom in her tone. ‘At least I have someone.’

He laughs.

* * *

 

The smell of chlorine acts like a drug in an odd way. It clears her head, and makes her focus on all her thoughts as she races against imaginary enemies.

It’s liberating.

Today was a bad day. Gloss held her hand at the end of the meeting, and asked her out to dinner. She only managed to turn him down in broken sentences before racing to the pool, three hours ago.

She’s been doing laps, trying to stop memories of Newport, trying to remember it wasn’t her fault and all she feels is like she’s drowning.

Each stroke is another thought.

_Why didn’t I say no?_

_Why didn’t I scream louder?_

_Why did I leave with him?_

_I thought I was better._

_Gloss isn’t Marvel._

_I’m not fourteen._

She feels like she’s suffocating, and she lets her limbs stop moving.

She falls down to the bottom of the pool, her hair falling out of the ponytail and covering her eyes. Her lungs burn as the oxygen leaves them, and she wonders if she just stayed on the tiled bottom of the pool would it be better.

She doesn’t want to die. She’s never wanted to; but it’s been ten years and she still can’t be alone with people. She’s tired of this.

She’s tired of the way she feels off, like something’s wrong with her. She’s just tired.

The water feels safe, and overwhelming at the same time, and she doesn’t want to leave the bottom of the pool.

 _If only I could grow gills and a tail_ , she muses, _everything would be better as a fish._

Fish have a limited memory, well a gold fish does, and she thinks that is a blessing.  She’d love to forget.

It feels like eternity under the water, but she has to surface now, or else she doesn’t think she’ll be able to leave.

Breaking surface, she gasps for air and her vision is obscured by her hair.

‘I was wondering when you would come up for air.’

Her grandmother’s voice echoes around the empty pool, and she pushes her  hair out of her eyes and kicks to the side of the pool.

Mags Cohen had married her high school sweetheart, at age nineteen during World War Two. Daniel Cresta, the son of the head of PIMCO had returned from the war soundly, and had taken his father’s position in sixty two, when their son, Jonah was five.   Daniel had died of heart complications when Annie was ten, five years after his only daughter died of leukemia.

Mags was her only family left in the world, and Mags would never have considered living anywhere else but Newport Beach. It was all she knew, and all she loved.

But when Mags found her, trying to let the ocean swallow her, tear tracks mixed with make up streaking her face, sundress sloppily undone and crescent marks from her nails and scratches from when she tried so hard to rub herself raw.

It wasn’t her, it wasn’t.

Mags hadn’t said anything, but hold her hand and lead her home. She had put Annie to bed, and when she woke up, her grandmother had told her they were moving to Cambridge.  It was a whirlwind, and fourteen year old Annie was silent, shock her therapist said, she was in shock.

Everything had changed in forty-eight hours; it was only fair to assume she was in shock.

‘I never know if I will.’  Annie admits, pulling herself out of the pool. Mags, out of Newport, but never out of Newport style, a problem in January where she refuses pants, preferring longer skirts, and pastels,  is sitting on a white plastic cheap beach chair, her ankles crossed primly and her clutch on her lap.

The look on her grandmother’s face is one she knows all too well. It’s a combination of heartbroken failure, shame of not being able to stop it, and pity that she cannot stand.  There is blame in Mags eyes. She blames herself for what happened.

‘I know darling.’ Mags says, never moving from her chair.  ‘And I will always be waiting to drag you up.’

‘You shouldn’t.’ It slips out, and she wants to take it back, but she can’t. Doctor Wiress says she needs to stop keeping her thoughts inside, bottling them up makes them pile up and it causes her stress, and anxiety, and results, always in a large anxiety attack.

Her last one caused herself to lock herself in the bath tub.

Mags looks like she slapped her.

‘I’m sorry.’ She apologizes. ‘I’m sorry. Grandma I’m sorry. I didn’t mean-I’m sorry.’

She’s on her knees, holding her grandmother’s hands, feeling sick like she’s injected herself with ash, at the colour draining off her grandmother’s face.

‘No I didn’t mean it. I didn’t. Grandma, I’m sorry.’

It takes several minutes for Mags to gain colour back into her face, and she claps Annie’s hands tightly, her eyes a shade of green deeper than Annie’s own, don’t leave her.  She feels herself shrink into her grandmother’s  stare, feeling more like a helpless child than an anxiety ridden adult.

‘One day, you will have to explain why.’ Her grandmother says gravely, ‘And that day I will understand.’

‘I try.’ It comes out like a whisper, a trickle of water over rocks, still held back by a dam.  She tries, so hard, but she doesn’t know how to make the string of words in her head all jumbled and mixed up, a coherent sentence.

* * *

 

‘I’m getting married.’ Katniss stares at her reflection in the bathroom mirror. Peeta is still at work, and her seminar had ended early. She was just going to drop off a text book, before heading to the library to work on a case study.

Peeta had gotten the mail, and _Bride Today_ was sitting on the coffee table, like there was spotlight on it.  She hates those magazines.

It’s horrible; the glossy pages give images she doesn’t want.

The subscription was an engagement present from Prim, one that she protested about and was promptly ignored.

It’s a monthly reminder.

She is getting married.

‘Katniss Everdeen is marrying Peeta Mellark.’ Her face is too thin, long and pointy. Her hair is dark, a weird mixture of brown and black with the odd blonde streak that shows she is Violet Everdeen’s daughter, even if she favours Daniel.

‘Peeta Mallrak.’

They’re both from Detroit, and they went to the same high school, she on a scholarship.  But she’s from Livernois Avenue. Girls from Livernois Avenue don’t get married; they get knocked up and abandoned.

They don’t go to NYU and they sure as fucking hell don’t go to law school.

And no matter what, they don’t marry a Mellark boy.

‘I’m twenty-two and I’m getting married.’

Twenty-two feels too young. Her mother was only twenty-five when she had Katniss, and she and her father had struggled, the factory was suffering, before he got assigned to District 12, and the accident.

Twenty-two is when she should be dancing and having hot, crazy passionate sex, and  not to dismiss the very nice sex she and Peeta have been having, it’s all been just a little….bland. Twenty-two is not when she should be having the sex with the person she’s going to spend the rest of her life with.

Twenty-two feels too young to be flipping through the magazines, knowing she’s never going to be able to afford the pretty white dresses, not on Peeta’s barista salary and her student loans. Peeta isn’t even letting her take a job to help out, not until next semester where apparently there is some internship that will open up, or at the very least she can TA some undergrad classes.

‘I’m getting-‘she can’t make the words leave her mouth again, they still feel wrong and turn her stomach in ways she can’t understand.

This is too much.

She refuses to think, she refuses to focus on the wedding, or her feelings or anything of the sort.

Instead she strips from her dress pants and nice blouse she found at Value Village, and gets into her running clothes.

She needs air.

Maybe if she runs, the distance will give her perspective, make it easier or something like that.

She grabs her small MP3 player, it’s black and clunky and it was graduation present when she graduated high school, and locks the door behind her.

It’s a long run, it starts like a sprint, then when her lungs hurt and her legs quake, she changes the pace to a jog.

Each stride takes her further away from her cozy apartment with Peeta.  But the invisible weight doesn’t go away.

The thing about distance, and running a circuit, is that you can run for as long as you want, but you’re always going to come back to the beginning, and the distance you’ve garnered is pointless because you’re still looking at the situation in the exact same place as before.

* * *

 

She has been very luckily that she has not met up with the dark haired asshole that she spilt her coffee on, since the incident despite coming to The Fourth almost daily.

But luck runs out, and while she’s lounging in an armchair by the window, watching the ugly white wet flakes of snow fall like someone’s dumping trash out upstairs, the little bell rings, and Peeta who is the only one manning the store,  turns to attention and for the first time his crooked smile is slower to arrive.

‘Gale.’ Peeta says flatly, ‘Hi. What can I get you?’

‘One Americano.’  A deeper voice says, and there’s a man with a bored, slightly annoyed expression on his face.  Snow is melting in his hair, as coins are exchanged and he takes the mug and turns to the corner she’s in, obviously looking forward to the small desk when he spies her.

His spine straightens and his already dark expressions turns sour and darkens immensely.

‘You.’ He spits, strolling over to the desk, where he carefully lays his coffee down before reaching into his bag and pulling out a pad of paper and pencils and pens.

‘Me.’ She answers in a matching tone. ‘No fancy tablet today asshole?’

‘How would I have one when my last tablet some bitch spilt coffee on it?’ He rebuttals. ‘They cost fucking a lot of money.’

There are drops of shame down her spine, but she doesn’t want to let them show. She doesn’t remember his name-it started with a G- but he had a business card, and people with business cards always had money.

Except, obviously not, as when she takes a second look at what he is wearing. They are all clean, but they show wear and tear, as if they are well worn. Evidently he is not as well off, as a shitty tablet makes it seem.

‘You shouldn’t have been that close to me.’ Johanna says snidely, flipping out her iPhone to do a quick search on the cost of tablets. The first two results show iPads, and she knows he didn’t have one of those, and the next one in the list is the Microsoft Surface Pro, which is just a little less than a thousand dollars. She quickly scrolls down to the Sony one, which according to the article is around five hundred dollars, but the Nexus one is only two hundred.

Tablets are fucking expensive. Who knew?

‘You should look where you’re fucking going.’ He mutters, before ignoring her.

It’s silent, when she looks at the screen at the prices, while he scribbles through his paper.

‘I’m sorry.’ She is, she never thought an entire coffee would destroy a tablet. Its importance is very evident, if he’s resorting to paper and pen doing…whatever he does.

‘Whatever.’

‘I am.’ She doesn’t reach out to touch hum, but she stares at him until he has to take his eyes off the paper, to look at her. ‘Jo.’

She holds out her hand, and he looks at it suspiciously, like there’s an ulterior thought behind a handshake. After a few seconds, he shakes it.

‘Gale.’ Right, the G name. She swore to god she thought Gale was a girl’s name. It doesn’t seem prudent to mention that whoever named him, obviously had a vendetta for him. She absently wonders if that is why he always looks angry.

‘Sorry about your tablet.’

‘Whatever.’ He dismisses her to go back to his work.

‘No.’ She forces, managing to get him to look at her again, ‘No. I am. I feel like a bitch about this, and I should make it up to you.’

She doesn’t add that this new found feeling of guilt comes from how stretched his funds must be, if he can’t afford a two hundred dollar tablet over the course of the past few months. 

‘Why now?’

She shrugs, ‘Bad karma? Fate? The fact I thought I wouldn’t see you ever again? Pick one, it doesn’t really matter does it?’

His eyes are dark, and intense.  She would say smouldering,  if she was that type of girl who read trashy romances; if she was that type of girl she would also know this is the perfect set up for a whirlwind cliché romance, one where she defrosts and he becomes kinder.

Inside her head she laughs, she’s read those Harlequin romances. Hell word porn works better on her than visual porn, but the thing about porn is that in every incantation it is incredibly fake, the storyline sucks and no girl wants someone to cum on their face constantly. It’s so bad for your hair.

This is real life, and while Gale is hot, he’s also angry, cold and from her admittedly limited view, a self-righteous prick.

‘I don’t want your pity.’ He says finally, turning back to his work.

She rolls her eyes. ‘It’s not pity.’

‘Charity then.’

‘It’s trying to be a decent human being have you heard of it?’ She snaps, getting up angrily and stomping to his desk. She steals his pencil and on the edge of the paper, not getting anywhere near his technical drawings of lines she scribbles her number. ‘Look meet me at the Micro Center Saturday at three. I’ll buy you a new fucking tablet. And if you feel so unhappy about this, buy me a coffee and we’re even.’

She lets the pencil drop, done with this conversation, and irrationally angry at him she ignores him as she bundles up, grabbing her purse and jamming the knit hat on her head, she returns her empty mug to Peeta.

‘Thanks.’ She says briskly. ‘I’ll see you later.’

Peeta nods and she leave The Fourth as quickly as possible, feeling pin pricks on the back of her neck where Gale had been staring at her.

* * *

 

Mothers are supposed to be loving, mothers are supposed to be kind. They are supposed to smell nice and their touches are supposed to bring you home. Mothers are never the ones who drink, who scream and who hit.

Those are what fathers are supposed to do.

At least, that is what every television show while growing up in the early two thousands have told him. Abusive parents are always fathers, which is why it took him until he was eighteen and he had to take a sociology course to fill a requirement, did he not associate his mother with abuse.

He had, for years known his mother was a horrible person. It was no secret. He understood, from his brothers that his mother was a bitter woman resentful that her husband never loved her, but married her because she was pregnant. It was in the eighties, and there still was a stigma for single mothers, and abortions were not a thing even remotely suggested for good catholic girls.  Divorce was never an option either.

He had supposed that for a time they must have been happy.  After all, he and his middle brother Rye had been born, in eighty-seven and ninety-two respectively. There must have been some effort to save their marriage, and he’s sure there are happy family memories without tension in the under currents.

He’s positive he has them, he just can’t remember.

And it is not like he has faced the worst of her wrath, Rye and Bannock had shielded their baby brother, and their father did too, if he wasn’t at work.

He still remembers his mother screaming at Bannock, when she found he turned down Columbia for Oxford that she wished she aborted him when she had the chance.

Bannock hadn’t come home since then, and he had cut off his mother and the rest of the family save for the annual Christmas letter. He hadn’t even been invited to Bannock’s wedding, and he only found out about his niece by the photo enclosed.

He didn’t know her birthday.

 Bannock’s rejection seemed to have spurred something in his mother, and all her attention were devoted to her remaining sons. Rye had always been able to roll his mother’s insults and fists off his back like a pesky fly and he’s successful in real estate, he lives in Michigan with his boyfriend, still close to Detroit, but far enough that their mother can’t come drop in unexpectedly.

Rye had fought for Peeta’s right to study art, rather than science because their mother never understood that some people just don’t understand philosophy.  It was only when his teachers started praising his art, did his mother approve of his subject matter.

He’d almost prefer her disapproval, as her approval brought fierce pressure. He had to do more, he had to do better. He had to be perfect, or else he was wasting everyone’s time, squandering his talent.

When he graduated, he had showcased a few of his pieces in small art galleries in New York. One, abstract oil on canvas of Katniss had sold for five thousand dollars, nothing else had.

It’s been eight months and nothing he’s done has reached that level.         

Oil, acrylics, prints, charcoals, hell even wax crayons have all turned up shit.  It’s like he’s suddenly forgotten how to draw, how to make something beautiful out of a blank canvas.

It scares him more than he can say, more than it should, and he doesn’t know what on earth to do. He’d blame his mother, but whenever he gets another one of her emails or phone calls, his fingers itch to do something.

To prove his mother wrong.

It still turns out shit.

Also, for a woman who has disowned her son, she is doing a very poor job of acting out the role of disowned family.

He’s got his break, and it’s long enough to take some of his latest works, charcoal and acrylic on canvas to the Out Of The Blue Gallery on Prospect, he’s hoping for a better response.

The redhead curator, who reminds him of a fox, gives his work silent completion for several moments.  He wonders what she’s s thinking, and her face gives no real answer.

He tried to have a conversation with her once, it was short and awkward and he never attempted to do that again, but as he shifts awkwardly he thinks he probably should try again.

‘I’m sorry.’ She shakes her head, handing back the three paintings, ‘They’re good Peeta, it’s just not…resonant. Have you tried Homesense?’

He lets out a breathe that comes with the rush of disappointment, which is all too familiar lately.

‘Thanks. ‘He says, going through the motions of wrapping the canvas’ up and shaking her hand.

‘Really Peeta, going commercial might be the best idea for you.’ She says earnestly, and he can’t tell her how it feels liking selling out and really when did he become such a hipster activist?

Commercial can be steady, money is always needed, with the wedding coming up.

He needs to decide, and soon.

* * *

 

The minute he sent the text message on Friday, he immediately regretted it. He does know the woman, Jo, from a hole in the wall, and having her offer to buy him a new tablet, one that is very much needed, is suspicious.

He’d have bought one earlier, if Rory had smoked three hundred dollars’ worth of the weed he was supposed to deal. Rory didn’t have three hundred dollars and had called him in the middle of the night, still high terrified he was going to get shot or get their family shot.

His brother is an idiot, a fucking idiot who seemed to think he could do what Gale did, without thinking what Gale did had been out of necessity, and he had been smart. He never dealt in their neighbourhood, never to kids under fifteen and he never touched the stuff.

He worked sixty hour weeks in high school to get himself out of there, to get a job to get his family out, but Rory seemed to be determined to just smoke it up.

Frustrated with his brother, it’s affected the schematics of a building he has to present in two weeks and he has been sketching it out nonstop, he tears the paper out of his sketchbook he keeps in pocket and violently toss it in the trash.

There isn’t even a guarantee that Jo will come, she could just set him up as a punch line for a sick joke.

_Oh yeah this I broke this guy’s tablet and he can’t even afford a new one, so I said I would buy him one, and then I never did._

‘What did the paper ever do to you?’ It’s a sarcastic voice, and when he turns, there’s Jo with her hands shoved in her pocket and a bemused expression painted on her face, that turns into a smirk. ‘Did it interrupt your high school-esque brooding?’

‘What?’

She smirks, ‘You’re such a brooder. All dark and mysterious, anxiety bullshit. If you were a teen drama, all the girls would want you.’

He doesn’t know what to say, but he falls in line with Jo as they enter the Micro Center.

‘So, Finn tells me that the best one to get is Sony.’ Jo says conversationally, ‘All the reviews seemed to go that way too. Is that cool?’

‘Yeah, that’s fine.’ He had a Nexus before, but beggars can’t be choosers and he still doesn’t quite believe she is buying a complete stranger a tablet.

‘You should smile more. I mean, I _am_ buying you some electronic shit.’  Jo tells him, as they find the tablets.

He gives her a look, as they stroll down the aisles, ‘I don’t know you at all.’

‘Jo. ‘ She tells him, ‘I moved from L.A end of August. I’m a reporter. And you are?’

‘A junior architect. From New York. ‘

‘Cool.’ Jo stops in front of a tablet and taps the screen. ‘They are touch screen right?’

‘Yeah.’ Gale says, staring at the start up screens.

‘So you gonna tell me why you were so pissed?’

‘My brother.’ He says absently,  as Jo finds the Sony model and waves down a sales clerk.

‘Brothers, a pain in the ass.’

‘You have one?’

‘Had. He died.’

‘Fuck. I’m sorry.’ He watches her carefully, and it looks like her eyes are deeper for a moment, and he wonders if she is reliving her brother’s funeral the way he relives his father’s every time someone mentions him.

‘Don’t be. ‘She says easily, and it’s like it never happened, and they were discussing the weather, how bored she sounds. ‘You never knew. So why were you pissed at your brother?’

He hesitates, as they wait for a new tablet to be brought to them. It’s bad form to discuss business, and she’s a stranger; but at the same time he doubts she’ll tell anyone and she doesn’t even know his last name.

And really it’s the fact his brother has been so unbelievably stupid, that he’s putting their family in danger that makes his decision to tell her easier.

‘He smoked up three hundred dollars of weed.’

He’s not sure what type of reaction he was expecting, but the low whistle and approving nod of the head was not one.

‘Damn. In one night? By himself?’ Jo asks, as the salesclerk with dark square glasses and pimples hands him the box with his tablet and directs them to the check out.

‘I don’t know. I never asked.’

‘Well if he did it by himself, that’s pretty fucking impressive. I mean he’s not hospitalised is he?’ She pays with credit to the cheery girl in polyester blue.

‘No. He’s just a fucking idiot.’ Gale tells her.

She laughs, and it’s a full body laugh, sarcastic and uninebriated. ‘Gale, in my experience all men are fucking stupid.’

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for those who put this on alert, leave kudos, bookmarks and comments. It really makes my day.
> 
> My tumblr is seevikifangirl, drop me a line there if you have any questions!
> 
> Thank you so much for reading!

**Author's Note:**

> So, this is the first chapter. Everything takes place in Cambridge Massachusetts for several reasons, the first being the schools there.
> 
> The second I really like the city.
> 
> My tumblr is seevikifangirl, where I will be posting snips of chapters and answering all or any questions for this.


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